The Strange Adventures of Eric Blackburn | Page 5

cold and white; and, as soon as there was light enough to enable me to
see from the crest of one swell to that of the next, I began to look about
me in the hope of finding flotsam of some sort that would be useful to
me; also it occurred to me that there might be some who had
remembered that cork jackets were to be found in every state-room, and
might have made use of them; in which case I might fall in with other
survivors, who might be useful to me, and I to them, if we joined
forces.
For several minutes my search of the surface of the sea proved fruitless,
at which I was distinctly disconcerted, for I knew that there were many
articles of a buoyant nature which had been lying loose about the decks,
and which must have floated off when the ship sank; and I was
beginning to fear that somehow I had got out of my reckoning and had
missed the scene of the catastrophe. But a minute or two later, as I
topped the ridge of a swell, I caught a momentary glimpse of
something floating, some fifty or sixty fathoms away, and, striking out
vigorously in that direction, I presently arrived at the spot and found
myself in the midst of a small collection of brooms, scrubbing-brushes,
squeegees, buckets, deck-chairs, gratings, and--gigantic slice of
luck!--one of the ship's life-boats floating bottom up! But of human
beings, living or dead, not a sign; it was therefore evident that, of the
five hundred and thirty-five aboard the Saturn at the moment of the
disaster, I was the sole survivor.
Naturally, I made straight for the upturned life-boat; but recognising
that a bucket might prove very useful I secured one and towed it along
with me. Reaching the boat I was greatly gratified to find that not only
was she quite undamaged but also that she was riding buoyantly, with

the whole of her keel and about a foot of her bottom above the surface
of the water. Of course the first thing to be done was to right the boat,
and then to bale her out; and, with the water as smooth as it then was, I
thought there ought not to be much difficulty in doing either. The
righting of the boat, however, proved to be very much more difficult
than I had imagined. She was a fairly big boat and, floating wrong side
up and full of water, she was very sluggish, and for a long time scarcely
responded to my efforts; but I eventually succeeded, and, with a glad
heart, seized the bucket I had secured, hove it into the boat, and
climbed in after it, finding to my joy that, even with my weight in her,
the boat floated with both gunwales nearly four inches above the
surface of the water. Thus there would be no difficulty in baling her dry;
and this I at once proceeded to do, working vigorously at the task, not
only with the object of freeing the boat as speedily as possible, but, still
more, to restore my circulation and get a little warmth into my chilled
and benumbed body.
CHAPTER TWO.
THE "YORKSHIRE LASS."
By the time that I had baled the boat dry the sun was above the horizon,
the air had become quite genially warm, and my exertions had set my
body aglow, while my clothing was rapidly drying in the gentle breeze
that was blowing out from about north-west; also I discovered that I
had somehow developed a most voracious appetite.
Fortunately, I was able to regard this last circumstance with equanimity,
for the manager of the Planet Line of steamers had laid it down as a
most stringent rule that while the ships were at sea all boats were not
only to be maintained in a state of perfect preparation for instant
launching, but were also to be fully supplied with provisions and water
upon a scale proportional to their passenger-carrying capacity, and each
was also to have her full equipment of gear stowed in her, ready for
instant service. Now, the boat which I had been fortunate enough to
find--and which, by the way, seemed to be the only one that had not
been carried down with the ship--was Number 5, a craft thirty-two feet

long by eight feet beam, carvel-built, double-ended, fitted with
air-chambers fore and aft and along each side, with a keel six inches
deep to enable her to work to windward under sail. She was
yawl-rigged, pulled six oars, and her full carrying capacity was twenty-
four persons, for which number she carried provisions and water
enough to last, according to a carefully regulated scale, four days, or
even six days at a pinch.